Hub bearing units of this type are well known. These bearing units replace the shaft and bearing for supporting the vehicle wheels. The units, which incorporate rolling bodies and thus in practice are bearings, are mounted to the rotating portion of the units. Units of the type in question are described in DE-A-No. 3,018,172.
In the above mentioned German patent, a unit for both driven and non-driven wheels is shown. The unit has two rows of balls which have a common outer race ring with a flange for the attachment of the unit to the vehicle. The flange is connected to the vehicle via a steering knuckle housing 12. This steering knuckle housing, which in the present case is moulded, in turn supports two ball joints 13 and 14, which make it possible to rotate the unit about the so-called "King pin"-inclination.
The arrangement with the steering knuckle housing according to the above patent requires a large amount of space. The distance from the bearing to the king pin shaft is very big. Recently, it has been tried to make the units more compact than what is shown in the above patent. The spindle housing has also been made of stamped sheet metal. An example of such an embodiment is shown in SE-8206319-9.